


Desiderium

by Theheroshield



Series: Fortis de Luminis [2]
Category: Dissidia Duodecim: Final Fantasy, Dissidia: Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-21
Updated: 2014-08-21
Packaged: 2018-02-14 01:25:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2172666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Theheroshield/pseuds/Theheroshield
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cycle after cycle the Warrior of Light is purified of his memories, leaving him an empty vessel for the next cycle...but what if some remnant of memory clung to him? What memory would that be? And if his enemies understood how the memories are still imprinted on his soul's blueprints, to what use could they put the fragments of his mind to?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Desiderium

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in one go. I had this in my mind, sitting in the dark caverns, while I tried to write up another scene for my original works. I wasn't able to continue with my original works until I gave in and wrote this (suggested by someone on a forum). This is admittedly dark, probably the darkest stuff I've ever written. You've been forewarned.
> 
> Also, fyi, Desiderium is a real word that I'm glad to say fits in with the Duodecim, Dissidia, etc. word scheme. I fortunately happened upon the word (via a word-a-day to my email) while looking for a title for this fic. Feels like fate conspired to get this fic completed. xD

His eyes are as shards fallen from the sky, fallen to earth. His hair flows like silver from a mountaintop. The pale lips, the slim, slender body, the arched brows and long shapely legs…he is a statue craved from antiquity, awoke with a fiery passion.

The light follows him everywhere. It encases him like a divine power, borne out of his very soul. As he moves it is like lightning to the brain, stealing one’s very breath away. He slashes and strikes like the sword and shield are extensions of his arms, living entities that answer to his every call.

And he will be mine.

I decided this a long time ago, upon first setting eyes on the Warrior. I remember the moment he came into this world, still dazed, and wreathed in that illumination. I missed my chance to claim him then, and many times since. But beyond those initial failures the cycles continued, leaving more opportunities to bend that proud back, those strong knees, that fierce gaze, to my will…

As with our many other battles, in this fray he is indifferent to me. As I send my chain swirling in his direction the Warrior artfully dodges, reversing his spin in time for a counterstrike. The sound of his sword against my chain rings loudly in this chamber, the throne room of the Temple of Chaos. 

I think it fitting that this scene plays out here.

I leapt within a few feet of the Warrior then rip off my mask. It clangs against the stone floor. Scraggly hair, as grey as my iron chains, flares out and streams down my back. How unkempt I must look to him, to this paragon of virtue and radiance. 

“Look at me!” 

For a moment I see a glimmer of recognition in those ice-blue eyes…and then it is gone. He rushes forward for a strike and I get my chain up just in time to parry. Again that sound in this otherwise obscenely silent chamber. I wipe the sweat from my brow and even he pauses for a breather—we’d been battling for the better part of an hour. 

“Come, Warrior, your feigned ignorance is for naught. You might delude yourself into believing there is an end to the cycles…none came before this, and none will come after…but deep down you know you’ve repeated this fight many times before.”

That cold defiance straightens his shoulders, set his lips into a firm line. “It does not matter, what could have been. There is only the here and now. I will sever the chains of fate and put an end to all this!”

A thrill heats my blood. Beside his initial and irritating speech before our bout, the Warrior declined to respond to any of my provocations. The fight must be wearing on him. Even disdainful responses are more progress than his haughty silence. 

“Surely you must remember something of your past…something of past cycles…something of me?”

He freezes, as if a silver of memory flashed in his mind. It is exactly the distraction I need.

My chain sails out to wind around his left ankle. Expecting another charge or an explosion of stone or iron, the Warrior is taken by surprise. He falls heavily to the floor, his head colliding painfully with the stone. That ridiculous helmet flies off his head and as I reel him in, he loses hold of his shield as well.

With relish, I haul my prey in. As the Warrior struggles to stand I lunge at him, crushing him to the floor. The way his head bashed against a step dazes him further, and he is unable to fight me off. I disarm him and fling the sword across the room. It lands next to a marble column.

His hand whips out for a punch but I grab it with my own, squeezing it mercilessly. He lets out a pained yelp and I smirk. There will be more cries than that when I’m done with him. As he futilely squirms beneath me, I grab the ankle still enmeshed in my chains and throw the chain upwards, looping it through an overhanging chandelier in the ceiling. 

Up he goes, yelling in shock. The pain on his ankle must be wretched indeed. The Warrior tries to curl his body up to reach it but I restrain him with one hand, dragging both his arms behind his back. For a moment there he jerks against both my hand and the chain. Then he goes eerily still. 

I see his upside down face, the spill of his white hair gleaming in the light streaming down through the cracks of the ruined ceiling. He is mastering himself once more. The statue-hero returns. Eyes purposely ignore mine, his breathing steadies, and his mind works fast for a way out of his predicament…this I can tell from the twitching of his cheeks.

Smiling, I use my free hand to undo the strap to his left pauldron. It falls with little fanfare to the floor. The other is dispensed with just as easily. Then I set to work on his greaves, bracers, chest plate…I catch his eyes following me. A new set of emotions crashes into his face: confusion…and anger.

Between clenched teeth he utters, “Garland, what are you doing?”

The work is arduous as I’m handicapped because I must hold him in place with the other hand but I mind it not, fighting with the straps and buckles. I let my fingers slip to wherever they may as I progress. He is almost fully without armor now and I can feel the bewilderment building in his tensing body.

“The cycles, Warrior…Don’t you remember this?” 

He twists like a salmon on a line. His face fairly radiates cold rage. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Cease this foolishness, Garland.”

His voice quivered slightly as he spoke, and it glistened in my blood. I sensed the deviation from his disdain and then recognition to fury now. 

Yes, images swirled before his beautiful, alabaster face. What images exactly, I could not be certain. The Warrior is fighting his own encroaching memories, as if in realization that which is sought could be something he might not like to recall, in the end.

What one remembers cannot be un-remembered.

The last of his armour drops to the floor leaving him bare but for the blue bodysuit he wears underneath said armor. It would be little effort to fish out a dirk and stab him in the back now. If I had even wanted to I could have slit his pretty throat and watch as his hot, steaming blood dripped to the floor. But I had other plans…

Unencumbered by his armour, the Warrior curls up to free his ankle. I step back, and make no motion to stop him. He stumbles to the floor, striking it hard, forcing the breath out his body…this I gather by the way he gasps. Capitalizing on his weakness, I slam my body into his against a step.

I think I hear a rib crack. A great groan of agony passes his lips. Too bad for that. He’d better get accustomed to pain. I force him down to the floor with my girth, nearly smothering that all-too-gorgeous face.

It is beyond gratifying to feel him struggle beneath me. White hot fire burns through my brain at the push of his muscles and the tight, choked sounds he makes. I want him, right then, right there, but restrain myself.

There is a great price in store for those who wait.

Even as I ease off the Warrior, I give him no time to mount an attack. With a single hand I pin both of his arms above his head of platinum hair then settle my weight on his lower body, my knees flanking his hips. He bucks underneath like a surly chocobo and I laugh. 

“Does that feel natural to you? Did memories of the cycles remind you of that?”

Instantly his face goes pure scarlet and he stops. He opens his mouth slightly, tongue darting with uncertainty, but says nothing. Then the lips seal shut.

“What is it you’re trying to reach?” I ask as I lower onto him, knowing precisely what he’s feeling against his thigh. “Did you want to feel this?” I time my words exactly for when the fabric covering his own length touches with mine.

Now the colour drains from his face. No haughtiness. No anger. Not even confusion now. My toes tingle as panic slowly crawls across his face. He is no longer a proud warrior, indignant of being mocked and manhandled. He is very, very afraid.

As he should be.

“Garland…what do you want?” The odd mixture of pride and anger from the steeliness of his tone surprise and annoy me. He is combating the fear of what I have in mind; he is not surrendering to me, not just yet, and I find this both maddening and alluring.

Without answering, I use my teeth to lift the glove off my free hand and spit it away. Gently, I place my cool fingers against his forehead. Sweat-beads slid down his skin. I run my finger along the plane of his nose then dip my fingers into his mouth, forcing it open, and keeping the teeth from interfering with my exploration.

The Warrior smacks his head against the tiled floor as he fights my fingers intruding into his mouth…it’s as if he’s preparing to battle strangulation. I chuckle as the confusion darts in his eyes and I search the cavity of his mouth with my fingers. This feeling, of being submerged within him licks along my bones, burning me. I contain it. Feeling the desperation, befuddlement, and fright coursing his body is worth my self-control.

“Do the cycles…the memories…bring back memory of this? The taste of me?”

Now he begins to gag, whether by design—to rid himself of my fingers—or by accident, I don’t know. I withdraw, placing my hand on his chest. The heat of his body radiates through the fabric. He is breathing rapidly now, as if the images of the past were assaulting him. Those beautiful eyelashes flutter and then his eyes narrow, then back to fluttering…

I cannot tell what is going through his mind. Having seen this play out countless times before, still I never know what the Warrior recalls exactly when he reacts.

I decide to ‘help’ him. I lean down until our faces are inches from each other and kiss him fully on the mouth.

He lays limp. I relinquish his arms. He makes no move to escape. Was the great Warrior giving in or giving up? Did he no longer resist because he accepted pre-ordained fate or simply lacked the will to fight me? After I break the kiss I see him turn his head away. I glimpse something new this time…resignation? Surrender?

“You do remember.”

“I…No…It cannot be…” he starts, and then falls silent.

Grasping his jaw with a hand I force him to face me. Emptiness floats in the dark pit of his eyes. The thought that he is bound to me, to this fate, cycle after cycle, is unhinging his mind. He is sinking fast into somewhere inside himself, falling beyond my reach. I had seen many reactions to this scenario—anger, sadness, horror—but madness was one I had not considered or encountered before.

Immediately I plant kisses along his neck. The pulse in his neck quickens. Some part of the Warrior struggles against the submission to insanity. Another part, abhorring the reality he must now acknowledge but is too much for him, so that blissful unawareness must seem sweet indeed.

I can’t entirely fault the line of reasoning. It must seem like a kinder fate to descend into madness over accepting the fate we share, bound to one another. Perhaps the Warrior feels that escaping this wretched form of…affection?...is not through rage and hatred but insanity and apathy.

The thought of his escape terrifies me. If we are to suffer this horrible fate, we are to endure it together. I lower my hand from his chest to his groin. Breathing harshly into his face I draw him out, grip him hard, hard enough to produce pain and pleasure. 

He bolts upright and screams; it is a thin, pathetic sound. Then his crystal-blue eyes roll back into his head and he flops back down. Sagging, I take a breath, realizing I had drawn him from him the madness with a primal need that refused to be dismissed. 

I stare at the handsome face, wracked by agony, of the body and the mind. Snorting, I admonish myself for not being more careful. Of course this revelation would be traumatizing on him—the thought that the only affection he’d ever receive would be at the hands, literally, of his nemesis, must be devastating. I ought to have made allowances for that.

The self-chiding stops as I notice he stirs. When he opens those eyes again, they stare at me with a churning of violent emotions: confusion, mistrust, disbelief, agony, desperation, longing…and aching need.

This is all he has. This degrading, humiliating affection from a sworn villain. He has no home. No family. No real friends (those he commanded could hardly count). He has never been loved, nor ever has loved. Never kissed or touched or been kissed or touched…before this. Never felt a shred of real meaning…

…this is all he’ll ever have.

Unshed tears shine in the Warrior’s eyes. He does not give into them. 

“…You have nothing and no one. You will not feel warmth or affection from anyone…except me. Only I know who you are, only I can offer you this…take it, Warrior. Take what little the fates have deigned to give you…”

He swallows slowly. Then he shuts his eyes.

I smile again. The Warrior is not exactly encouraging my attention but he is no longer actively fighting me. This surrender, this abandonment of his dignity, is a sheer delight. I gurgle with absolute pleasure.

My hand comes alive, working along his shaft. At first he appears ignorant of my doings but as I increase the pace, I see a pink flush creep along his cheeks. His chest begins to heave. Though his eyes remain closed, the Warrior grimaces from time to time, as if maintaining some sad illusion of defiance.

A second hand joins the first, rubbing his thigh like it was firewood. At this point he groans, and I move faster, digging almost painfully into his flesh. He grits his teeth, and it sends a shiver up my spine as I realize that he is waging a war within the prison of his body, denying the release it desperately craves.

“Only I will ever care for you, Warrior. Only I will ever remember you.”

His eyes snap open. His whole body goes rigid. Then the Warrior climaxes, the warmth of him gushing over my hands. Tensing twice more as the pleasures sears his nerves; he is entrapped in this decadent, primal satisfaction. I dare say he forgets everything as the release takes hold. 

Then he slumps to the floor.

“Did that give you a moment of peace? Of joy? Of something other than the endless emptiness of your existence?”

The tears swiftly return to his eyes. As if a random pillar was a point of interest, he stares at that and not me. “No…,” he says, entirely without conviction. He sounds lost. Betrayed. 

“Your body tells me a different story,” I respond, wiping the remnants of him on my cape. 

As he comes to a half-sitting position, he winces from the truth of my words. They cut deep. It his own body that has betrayed him.

“Is that…,” he starts, falters, then treads on, “…is that…affection?” I can almost see the words floating in his head, dancing with hope, denial, longing, and disgust.

I smile. “Yes.”

He nods dully, defeated. The Warrior says quietly, “What now? What of the cycles? What of me? What of…us?”

My smile twists. Acting so swiftly as to squash any resistance, I grab his arms and flip him over. He gasps, shocked. Then I haul down the chain from above and use it to bind his arms behind him. He is too startled by the aggression in my movements to react. Positioning myself just below his hips I squeeze his legs between my own.

“What are you doing?” he demands, fear rising in his voice. Squirming beneath me, the Warrior finds no way out. 

“Just what you want. What the cycles foretold. What our fate has bound us to.”

The flurry of struggle increases twofold as I slip the lower half of his bodysuit down. Sliding a finger along the muscles in the mounds of his rear, I feel an answering flinch. It fills me with savage need, hardening me almost immediately. With a quick flick of my wrist and I pull myself out of my armour.

“We are bound together, Warrior. We cannot escape this. All we can do is take pleasure where we can find it.”

The Warrior resorts to kicking as I press my hardened flesh to the left cheek of his rear. I laugh low, knowing he must understand what is about to occur. His fingers clench and unclench in the chain.

“The more you struggle, the more…pleasurable this will be for me, and the more painful it will be for you.”

He stiffens. In a strained voice the Warrior utters, “No, please. Don’t.”

I bend forward to kiss him lightly behind the ear. “A bond isn’t just pleasure—it’s also pain.”

It is a shame that I cannot witness the expression on his face as I drive deep inside him. The shriek that tears from his mouth almost sweeps me away, ending the moment all too quickly. Gasping, I claw back from the precipice.

I know not whether the violence in my movements spurs his own, or that his body is again betraying him because of that desperate need for human contact, any human contact, no matter how humiliating it is for him. It only adds to my own enjoyment of the experience. I thrust hard inside the pulsing body, savouring his every ridge. 

He is sobbing now. It prompts me to slam myself harder into him, see just how much pleasure I can steal from his pain. The fury of ecstasy is digging into my spine and I know that I cannot hold back the rush of this for much longer.

“This is…affection? This is…?”

His agonized words push me back to the edge. I can feel my whole body shake. “Yes,” I mutter. “Tell me, Warrior. Tell me you surrender. Tell me because you have nothing else. No one else to give yourself to. No one else to feel any warmth, affection, or even recognition from.”

He groans, sorrow aching in his voice as he says, “Yes.”

Over the edge I go. For a moment the world careens sickeningly in my sight and all meaning is lost. The hot, writhing body of the Warrior beneath me, the hateful cycles dooming us to this contemptuous existence, the very air I breathe…it all washes away, drowned in the pleasure melting every cell of my body. Letting out a loud breath, I return to my senses. The Warrior has flattened against the floor, as if he might derive affection out of cold stone. I snort derisively. He is so starved of attention, he wonders if even rocks might provide some warmth.

I roll off him and he moans. Still swimming with the surge of pleasure I lazily watch him. He is studiously hauling his pants up, and trying to compose himself. The absurdity of this prompts me to laugh.  
Startled at the sound, the Warrior snaps his head around to look at me. The desperation, confusion, and longing in those pale eyes make me laugh louder.

“Why…why did I surrender?”

“Because you are mine, Warrior. You always were. Always will be.”

He tenses, tears springing to his eyes once more. They march down his beautiful face, as that accursed light, that celestial essence, brightens around him. He is an angel in human form, blessed by some god. The illumination flares so much that for a time I cannot see him at the centre. 

The light lifts off his body, abandoning him utterly. It floats high into the rafters of the temple. Like a child chasing his mother, he climbs to feet and jumps up for it. But it's beyond his reach now. Shortly after it is beyond even sight. His hands remain suspended as if the light would soon return. But I know it is gone forever, like mist on the morning sun.

His agonized scream is delicious. If I could hear it echo forever I’d never turn away.

“The light…Come forth! Come to me, light!” He is shaking, his face paling with a horrible dawning realization.

“Yes, Warrior. The light has left you. It no longer deems you worthy. You are dirtied, broken, and lost. The light only graces those who are pure, body and soul.”

He spins on a heel to face me, fury and grief duelling on his face. “But…but, that was…why, why would it?”

“That was no true affection, Warrior, and yet you surrendered your power. The light is given to those who hold their innocence sacred. You are no longer…innocent.” I grin, dining on the terror-filled expression of the Warrior. “You gave yourself up, and destroyed any chance that the light would grant you its power.” 

I think for a moment he will fling himself at me, fury consuming all reason. But instead his knees buckle and he stumbles to the floor. Hands and knees on the cold stone, the Warrior gazes with eyes dazzled, as if he is losing grip on his sanity again.

I grin; his tormented reaction is too delectable. Softly I say, “In each cycle you are gifted the light to combat the darkness. Each cycle ends with me robbing your light as I force myself upon you…” There I purposely stop speaking, watching him intently.

His head jerks up, eyes widening. “You…” He cannot finish.

“Yes, each time. Those encounters are what your body remembers. The trauma is retained cycle to cycle, but your mind has no recollection of why your body knows mine. It only knows that it is familiar…and it leaves an impression, however misguided, on your mind.”

“But…I thought…I knew you…And you were…we were…”

Finally he collapses completely on the floor, tears flowing freely from his eyes. I know he finally understands; the knife is firmly lodged in his heart as I was once lodged in his body. But I am not through with him. I must take this last bit of pleasure from him, the last tid-bit that I can…before the next cycle, of course.

I turn to the door and say casually over my shoulder. “But this time you surrendered to me. That, the light cannot forgive. The light will not return to you. Not in this cycle, nor the next. You are a Warrior of Light no longer.”

I'm not quite out the door when his scream cascades through the room like shock-waves from an avalanche. 

“See you next cycle, Warrior.”


End file.
